Dontrell, Who Kissed the Sea — Sisters Freehold

OPENING FEBRUARY 16

Click to purchase tickets.

“Future Generations, if I could,

I would die with every exhalation,

Then each breath taken in would be re-birth.

And I’d invent myself brand new again and again and again.

Is that how ya’ll do it, future?”

"A mesmerizing blend of magical realism and poetic social comment" - The Los Angeles Times

"Nathan Alan Davis’s script is sunny and lovable, despite its inexorable pull from present-day Baltimore

toward the slave trade’s notorious Middle Passage." - The Washington Post

"This fable about a young Black man’s search for an ancestor who leapt off a slave ship as it crossed the Atlantic weaves

storytelling, music, dance, and ritual into a fantastical tapestry [...] the result is thrilling." - Los Angeles Post

Eighteen-year-old Dontrell Jones the Third decides that it is his duty and destiny to venture into the Atlantic Ocean in search of an ancestor lost during the Middle Passage. But his family is not at all ready to abandon its prized son to the waters of a mysterious and haunting past. Blending poetry, humor, wordplay, and ritual, Dontrell, Who Kissed the Sea is a present-day hero’s quest exploring the lengths and depths we must go to redeem history’s wrongs.

Set in Baltimore (and partially developed here back in 2014!), this is a true Charm City story with stops at Johns Hopkins, The National Aquarium, and the Eastern Shore. Staged in the round for maximum audience immersion, director Makeima Freeland’s vision puts the emphasis on the rhythm, poetry, and flow of Nathan Alan Davis’ incredible script.

Performed at The Peale Museum (Baltimore’s Community Museum & the first building in the Western Hemisphere to be designed and built specifically as a museum!), Dontrell is a story that asks how we can move forward, venture, and ascend to new heights within our lineage without forgetting where we’ve come from but appreciating it fully.

Dontrell, Who Kissed the Sea is presented by arrangement with Concord Theatricals on behalf of Samuel French, Inc.

www.concordtheatricals.com

February 16-March 3, 2024.

Performances: Thursday-Saturday @ 8pm & Sundays @ 2pm

RUNTIME: 90 minutes with no intermission.

Recommended for ages 10 & up (mild profanity & sexual situations)

TICKETS: $15-35

Seating is limited. Click here to reserve your spot!

All performances take place here:

Latrobe Room @ The Peale Museum

225 Holliday St, Baltimore, MD 21202

For more about our beautiful historic venue,

please visit www.thepeale.org

TALKBACK

There will be a talkback following the 8pm performance on Thursday, February 29th, facilitated by Daniel Adegbesan (Sisters Freehold Board Member) and Founder of Community Movie Night!

Community Movie Night is a grassroots community engagement initiative committed to creating safe, accessible, and enriching dialogue opportunities centering the Afrodiaspora in the DC-Baltimore metro area.

Check them out here: https://www.instagram.com/communitymovienight/

ABOUT THE DIRECTOR:

When she’s not watching Seinfeld or solving puzzles, Makeima Elise Freeland is either reading to wise up or writing her life away through poetry, written prayers, nonfiction monologues about her life, and personal planning. She is passionate about her writing and other forms of creative expression, including directing. That is why theatre, the synthesis of all art forms, suits her well. Makeima loves directing and performing whenever she can. Her favorite acting role is William Barfeé in The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, performed at Notre Dame of Maryland University, where she attended before embarking on her journey as Co-Founder and Co-Artistic Director of Sisters Freehold. As a national minority who could have fallen through the cracks of the theatre industry herself, thanks to opportunity gaps and systemic gate-keeping, Makeima was able to prove herself in the industry early on, positioning her into the executive role she is in today where she uses her platform to open the gates for other artists systematically locked out of the theatre industry because as she often loves to say, “Theatre has everything to do with everybody.” ישו הוא מלך

Directing: 10x10x10 (Fells Point Corner Theatre), The Sleepover (Sisters Freehold), Herding Cats (Baltimore Playwrights Festival), & Curtain Up, Scenes from New Plays (Baltimore Playwrights Festival). Assistant directing: Us/Them (Sisters Freehold) Hamlet, presented in Original Shakespeare Pronunciation (Baltimore Shakespeare Factory). Rhetoric coach: As You Like It (Notre Dame of Maryland University) & The Merry Wives of Windsor (Baltimore Shakespeare Factory). Additional favorite past roles include Agatha in The Moors (Notre Dame of Maryland University), Valentine in The Two Gentlemen of Verona (a co-production of Notre Dame of Maryland University & Baltimore Shakespeare Factory), Lisa in Sanctity (Baltimore Playwrights Festival), & Lucy in The Devil Within (Downtown Cultural Arts Center). Makeima is a board Member-At-Large for the Baltimore Playwrights Festival and a member of the National Theatre Honor Society. ישו הוא מלך

Photo by Rand Black

ABOUT THE PLAYWRIGHT:

Nathan Alan Davis is a playwright and screenwriter based in New York and Boston. His writing for the stage includes The Refuge Plays (Roundabout Theatre/NYTW), Nat Turner in Jerusalem (NYTW), The High Ground (Arena Stage), Eternal Life Part 1 (Wilma Theater), Origin Story (Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park), The Wind and the Breeze (Cygnet Theatre), and Dontrell Who Kissed the Sea (NNPN Rolling World Premiere).

For his body of work, Nathan has received a Windham-Campbell Prize (2021), a Steinberg Playwright Award (2020), and a Whiting Award in Drama (2018). His TV/film work includes projects for Netflix, AMC, BET, and Paramount.

He is the Director of the MFA Playwriting Program at Boston University.

For more, please visit www.nathanalandavis.com

Photo by Peter Bellamy

CAST